THE NEW YORKER a little house in Saint- J ean-Cap- F errat, on the Riviera. It's a house we've gone to every second year for the past twenty-five years. It's on the tip of the Cap, with a nice view back toward Nice. Very quiet, and there's golf a twenty-two-minute drive away, up above Monte Carlo. But it was horrible getting back up to speed after two weeks of relaxing. When I think of my life in business, it seems, by comparison, to have been one of in- dolence. " Besides the faster pace, I asked, what other differences or similarities, if any, had he found between running a business and running an embassy? "The differences are easier to dem- onstrate than the similarities, but there are similarities for me," he said. "I've always been either in a staff position, as I was at the wax company, or, as I was later, in a sort of chairman-of- the-board position, where I had a chief operating officer who knew the techni- cal details and had the experience to run a business. In a sense, an ambassa- dor in a large embassy like this is in the position of chairman of the board of a medium-sized or large corporation, in that there is no way you can know everything that goes on in the opera- tion. You need a good D.C.M.-mine IS superb-and an adequate staff to whom you can delegate with con- fidence all the different operations that go on. In that sense, there is a great similarity to the positions I have held in several businesses. I think the stark difference is that I was used to looking at figures every day that would tell me about net profit before taxes or earn- ings per share or some accomplish- ment-you know, this week we made a profit or we didn't. Of course, in this business I don't see any figures." "You do see-or can see-all those cables that pour into the Embassy?" "Yes. I have always had a lot of reading to do. Anybody in a business or multiple businesses has to read trade publications and all kinds of input as far as information on the industry is concerned. But there is a paper bliz- zard here every morning. Not so much as there might be if I decided to try to read everything. I have a very good aide who not only reads the cables and screens them for me but underlines them, so that in effect I'm reading summaries. He also keeps track of my personal schedule, and he sometimes drafts remarks for me for various oc- casions. As for drafting the formal speeches, we sort of rotate that task around the Embassy. If it's an eco- 121 I , I I I Crom the Royal York, most eveI}'thing In Toronto IS at hand For busIness 1 Toronto:s major office towers are connected underground. For pleasure, fine dining, entertaInment and shopping are nght CP Hotels [. inside or just s eps away Direct airport bus to o r Royal York door Reservatlons 1-800-828-7442 In N.Y State. 100 FrontSUeet West, Toronto 1-800-462-7472. Or call your travel agent. Ontano M5] 15 (416)863-6333 The 10 Finest III ustrated Books of 1982 1 The Circus of Dr Lao by Charles G. Finney dlt/Jtrated by Claire Van Vliet 2. Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury dltlJtrated by JÐ.i;eph Mugnallll :; The House of the Dead by Fyodor DOJtoevJky tllttJtrated by FrItz Eichenberg 4. The Iceman Cometh by Eugene O'NeIll llluJtrated by ùonard BaJkm ) One Hundred Years of Soh tude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez Illustrated by Alejandro Obregon 6 Poems of the Caribbean by Derek Wa/cott IlluJtrated by Romare Bearden 7. Poems of Seamus Heaney Illustrated by Henry PearJon 8 A Streetcar Named Deslfe by TenneJsee WIlliams Illustrated by Al Hirschfeld 9. Tender Is the Night by F. Scott FItzgerald Illustrated by Fred Meyer 10 The Threepenny Opera by Bertolt Brecht Illustrated by Jack Ltvrne At least one of the illustrations bound in each book will be an original lithograph etching, or wood engraving. Editions are limited to two thousand copies and all are signed and numbered. THE LIMITED EDITIONS CLUB 551 Pzfth Aunlle New York, N. Y. 10017 o Enclosed is my check for $1000 for the 10 Books of 19 82 o Please charge my credit card for $ I 000 o American Express 0 Dmers Club 0 Visa 0 Mastercard Card Number Expires Signature NAME ADDRESS CITY STATE ZIP Or telephone: 800 223-0768 or 212 682-7115 New York 'tsidents please add appropnate taxes